Peter Jackson's Third HOBBIT Film Gets New Title

Fans of Middle-Earth were delighted to learn that when Peter Jackson's "Lord of the Rings" trilogy concluded, that three more films within "The Hobbit" umbrella were on the way. The latest installment "The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug" was incredible and raised the stakes to many fans, showing us what was possible for this prequel series. The third film, which was originally titled "The Hobbit: There and Back Again", is releasing in December and now it's being reported that the film has been renamed.

The new film is now titled "The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies". Some fans who read the original book, which has been split into three films, may not be too happy about this since the previous name was iconic. Others, myself included, could care less about the title because I'm so incredibly excited about the film.

Check out Jackson's incredibly thorough explanation below as to the sudden change:

"Our journey to make The Hobbit Trilogy has been in some ways like Bilbo's own, with hidden paths revealing their secrets to us as we've gone along. "There and Back Again" felt like the right name for the second of a two film telling of the quest to reclaim Erebor, when Bilbo’s arrival there, and departure, were both contained within the second film. But with three movies, it suddenly felt misplaced – after all, Bilbo has already arrived "there" in the "Desolation of Smaug".

When we did the premiere trip late last year, I had a quiet conversation with the studio about the idea of revisiting the title. We decided to keep an open mind until a cut of the film was ready to look at. We reached that point last week, and after viewing the movie, we all agreed there is now one title that feels completely appropriate.

And so: "The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies" it is.

As Professor Tolkien intended, "There and Back Again" encompasses Bilbo’s entire adventure, so don’t be surprised if you see it used on a future box-set of all three movies."